12 October 2012

Contraception is a Political Issue

Flipping through some old posters, this one from Australia’s Earthworks Poster Collective caught my eye. I love the humor and urgency, the pop of white ink on newsprint, and the appropriated and politicized style of romance comics. And though printed in 1979 it’s just as relevant today.

Obamacare is a huge leap forward for women’s reproductive health in the US. But it still casts contraception entirely as the responsibility of women. While birth control and tubal ligation are guaranteed and free, vasectomy is a patient responsibility that insurance companies may refuse to cover — despite the fact that vasectomy is essentially an outpatient procedure and has a much
lower risk of complications than female surgical sterilization methods.

I don’t anticipate a groundswell of men demanding free vasectomies, but suspect a court challenge will eventually update the law. The high courts do love an anti-discrimination case when it affects white people and men.